Masquerade Part 2.2: Klaatu, Barada... Necktie

[Xinnidy]

Maja turned her head at the sound of Makin's announcement; seemed it was about time. "Oh, guess it's time to go! Right, as soon as we find whoever's in charge, I'll have my answers." She stepped out of the wagon, spotting Makin and waving a hand her way. "I'm ready, boss." Despite usually being in high spirits whenever the group prepared to move out, Maja was rather neutral this time, perhaps understandably so. While walking towards Makin, a few questions rose in Maja's conscious, she finally settled on one as she was just beside Makine. "Uh, do I-- should I... keep a distance from everyone else? I don't know if... that, will happen again." Maja avoided eye contact when she brought the point, attempting but failing to not look discouraged; she had to acknowledge the worst case.

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Kadin nodded to Makin, and made his way to drop his sleeping bag by the wagon, his first objective before having his attention caught by Lanos. Catching Maja as she left the wagon, Kadin made no pause to address her, "Maja? Did you sleep well?" The girl seemed a bit caught on her thoughts, briefly turning to look at him and give a nod as she kept walking past. For all she went through, at least she was responsive this morning. Hmm, should I give her some space too? If Lanos was any indication, then maybe.

Deciding to speak with Maja later, Kadin stood and glanced the room as he waited for more people to be ready to move out. As Kadin laid his eyes upon Angus and Meredith, a thought made him move from his spot. "Good morning, Angus. You too, Ma'am." Kadin greeted, taking a few steps toward the two, "I recall you and Sonia looked into some of the other rooms before sleeping. Did you find anything?" Kadin spoke, facing the archer.

Edited February 25, 2016 by Xinnidy

[SB.]

"Well, we're here because we're looking for something." Angus shrugged. "I don't know what the 'something' is, and I don't even think Cedric knew either. Maybe it was just the girl in the box." He highly doubted that was all there was to this place, though. There was probably someone else here too, the guy who wrote the box book, as well as Tami. Were they the same person, maybe? He bit his lip. There was so much about this place they didn't know, and his thoughts were racing with possibilities - none of which were positive.

He was kind of grateful that Kadin had come to cut off his thoughts - and talking to him was probably less awkward than chatting with Meredith. "Hey. We found some medicine, a spear, poisonous dart traps... so basically, nothing you can't find in Felson." Maybe it wasn't the place for humour (and he wasn't sure if his company would appreciate it even if it was), but it calmed his nerves a little. "The medicine looks pretty normal, so hopefully we won't have, uh." He felt himself shrink back a little. Never mind about talking to Kadin being less awkward. "W-well, there was a book too," he hurried. "About the box Valha found. I haven't read a lot of it though."

[scorri]

Trist grumpily followed the group that was heading into a new room. He had no interest in being awake right now, but he seemed to have no choice. Hopefully they wouldn't run into a fight right now. He covered a yawn as he headed through the doors and held up there, waiting for the rest of the group to make their way through, figuring he could once again take up the rear guard.

[Nanami Touko]

"Well... We could look further, if you wanted to. If there's nothing here, like downstairs, it couldn't hurt to stake this whole area out. You wanna handle the downstairs, while I check up? Or should we stick together?" He put a hand on Valha's claw as it came onto his arm, smirking a bit. There probably wasn't a whole lot in here. That's how it felt, at least. The entire place was incredibly disarming, to be honest. He thought they'd be fighting hordes of monsters in here as well, but there had been nothing... Something had to be up.

"I'm never cheeky with people I think will take to lopping my head off, and even if someone was, most times I'm in a market, or at some vendor location. It'd take a real sociopath to up and come striking at me for some sharp words. They'd be jailed immediately, anyway. I'm not so frail that I couldn't hold someone off long enough for the guards to show up." She sneered a bit, like this situation had happened before. Well, it had, back in Ward. An unfortunate run in with a bandit, looking to pawn something he'd sold off. He thought he was hot stuff because he'd managed to steal the sword in the first place, so he didn't take too well to being compared to horse manure. Isabelle sighed and held herself, shaking her head.

"A cursed spear, hmm?" That was the only thing that caught her attention. She let herself go and quit thinking about hoof-face. "I did, before. The heart seeking spear deal. No idea if it was cursed, but it was definitely full of powerful magic. Even when I threw it, it went for the target I had in mind. Definitely a dangerous thing to give to anyone. So I didn't." She shrugged and took a step away from Raith, ready to go explore upstairs now that it had been ordered. Of course, she expected the curious soul in him to ask what happened to it, if she didn't sell it. She smirked a bit, wondering if he'd like her answer.

Makin waited for everyone that was read to head up the stairs, doing so herself, but being caught by Maja halfway up. "Oh, Maja. You're up. You feeling alright?" She'd be lying if she said she wasn't slightly apprehensive being so close to their new monster. "Should you... Ah, geez." Makin had to stop going up and think to herself for a moment. Would it be safer for the group to be away from her? But she was their healer, she was so necessary... And she didn't want to alienate her over something that could be fixed. "If... If you feel it taking over again, just... Bite someone you can trust, alright? Like, me, Kadin... You seem to be getting along well with Lina? Though, I don't know if you can trust her... But from what we were told, it'd be best if you just did that, instead of going mad. So make sure you do, alright? You can stick around us, of course. Maybe... Maybe not Lanos, though." The bird man still seemed bent out of shape.

[Vestige]

"Yeah, I figured you hadn--Wait, did you say you actually did find something like that?!" he asked, completely taken aback. There's no way that's true... He narrowed his eyes, "You have to be lying. There's no way something like that actually exists... " Well, that wasn't necessarily true. A cursed lance was hardly the most surprising thing he'd heard about, let alone seen. But still, how would someone even go about "finding" something like that, Raith wondered. Sheesh, some people have all the luck. "But wait, hold on. You said it was too dangerous to give to anyone, so... " Raith cocked an eyebrow, and waited for her to explain herself further.

[Juliette]

Heather slowly strutted up the stairs, not as eager as some to venture into unknown- possibly hazardous- territory. Yet none of the group seemed to find any threats when they made their way into the open room before her. "How unnerving..." the elven archer remarked aloud. "Not quite the opposition that was expected, then?" she asked Makin, not entirely certain how to assess the situation and preferring not to venture very far herself just yet- if others sought to endanger themselves so quickly, she deemed it not of her concern.

[algae]

The book hadn't been interesting enough to keep Sonia awake, unfortunately, but at least she had the awareness to push it off to the side before she nodded off. Nor did it prevent her from being one of the last people to wake up (something that made sense according to Early Morning Logic). In the interest of not getting left behind, she grabbed the book and hurried through the- Wait, I could have sworn that door was locked... Did someone else open it? That had to be it. Nobody seemed bothered by it and they would certainly have noticed if someone else had opened the thing. Right?

[eclipse]

For once, Meredith shut up when someone else spoke to Angus. She silently followed everyone else, quite happy with the lack of enemy activity. Hopefully, that wannabe lady of the night would continue to be friendly, and everyone would get through the castle in one piece. Then, they could go somewhere where the weather was warmer and the beds were softer.

[Xinnidy]

"Bite someone I trust...?" Maja winced at the thought of biting with the rest of the group looking, and made an internal prayer that it would never come to that. "I guess I'll ask somebody I feel comfortable talking about it, and try to keep my distance from the rest..." Maja sighed, she knew she needed to think about getting rid of the curse, disease, whatever it could be called. It was hard to keep hopeful after the past day and a half, however. "So... Boss, what do you think is up with this place? Like... the old houses we saw way back and now this castle." Putting her mind out of the more negative tangent, Maja threw the question as she made her way to the stairs, focusing on the nearly surreal setting they've stumbled upon. It was nice to wonder what kind of story these buildings had to them.

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"Is that right? Well, at least it's something." Kadin bit his lip at the awkward follow up by Angus, shifting his eyes away for a moment to look at Maja. "...That is fine, after all that's happened. It makes sense to think twice on anything that this place gives us for free, we're not the only ones here." Kadin spoke after a sigh, facing the archer once again, and maintaining a slow walking pace as the others started moving. "A book about the box? That might be helpful. Do you have it with you?"

[riariadne]

"I think we should stick together," Valha suggested. "Feels like it's askin' for trouble to split up, after we got through this far without runnin' into stuff... we can go whichever way you wanna."

[SB.]

"Sonia has it now." Angus glanced around, looking for the thief, but it seemed that she'd already moved on. "If you find her, she might be able to tell you more about it. I dunno how much of it she read." he shrugged. He had no idea how much of it Sonia had actually read last night, but she probably knew more of it than he did.

[Nanami Touko]

Isabelle smiled. "Yes, I did find something like that. And I hid it. Because it was far too dangerous to sell. Can you imagine what an experienced spear user could have done with that? Imagine the news in Felson, 'council murdered by magic spear, merchant arrested after monster is finally killed'. Giving something like that out would be tantamount to suicide." He'd probably ask where she hid it, like she'd actually tell him. But, this was interesting. Hmmm. "Tell you what. You prove that you're not some sociopathic monster, that you're trustworthy, and that you can keep yourself safe, and who knows? Maybe it'll end up in your hands. Better to have the stress of such a powerful weapon on your end than on mine." Legitimately, she really didn't care about the politics of it, but it would be a weight off her shoulders to transfer that responsibility to someone else. He'd probably break it before it mattered, anyway.

Meanwhile, the lack of opposition was definitely unnerving. "Yeah, quite," she threw back at Heather, worried something would jump out at them at any moment, while nothing did. How unnerving... At least Maja was taking things better than Makin had thought she would. "That's the spirit. We'll get you sorted out, alright? Nothing to worry about." They'd find whoever owned the place and make him fix her, no matter what. It was just magic, so there had to be something. "What do I make of it all?" She hadn't exactly stopped to think about it. "The books say this place used to have people living here. I don't know how long ago, but... Well, given the undead, we may have fought our way through the remnants of the villagers from this place. And whoever lives here has been running tests on all of them. Which is... Horrifying, to say that least."

"Horrifying, you say?"

"Wha--" Makin froze, as a voice shot through the room. The group had all made their way into the upstairs, nothing showing itself, but now, a voice had filled the space, coming from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. It sounded old, but wise, if not a bit maniacal.

"Looks like we aren't going anyway, Valha," Ingverd said as the voice boomed, stopping himself as well. He grabbed Valha's claw, squeezing it. This magic business always got him just a bit scared.

"I would say that it's quite alright, these people set up shop on my land without permission, and defied my demands for them to leave... So I took of them what I wished, until nothing remained." The voice continued to shuffle itself through the room, sometimes sounding louder from different areas. "And now you all, a group of powerful mercenaries; why are you here? Here for the secrets of the castle, like so many before you? Well, I could always use more test subjects..."

"Who are you? Where are you?" Makin didn't like being talked down to by a disembodied voice. It was more than just unnerving.

"I'm where I need to be," the voice responded curtly, "and you are all as well! I've got an offer for you. Since you've all made it this far into my castle, how about a test? Defeat my minions and you may take that which you wished to--" The voice stopped, almost as if it had realized something. "Hmm... I see the subject has escaped. I must say, I did not expect any of you to figure that one out. Perhaps she noticed the code, one day? Ah, well, it is no matter. You must all die, then. I can't have that leaving."

"What, but-- alright, hold on!" Makin felt more than a bit powerless, but as the voice stopped, nothing happened, still. Everything went back to quiet, leaving the mercenaries to their business. "Subject-- L-Lina, did he mean you?" Makin asked, twirling around to the woman. Did he mean the cube, then? That's all we've touched...

[eclipse]

"T-test subjects?!" Meredith spat out, to no one in particular. "And now this weird voice wants us dead? If he didn't want guests, he should've put a sign out in the hallway or something. HE'S the rude one!" she continued.

[Vestige]

"Trustworthy? I'm plenty trustworthy. In fact, I'm the most trustworthy guy I know," he said, nodding his head along as he spoke the words. "Unfortunately, I'm not sure about this whole monster bit. I'll be honest with you I've never really told anyone about myself, not as openly as I'm about to tell you. But I figure if I'm to gain your trust, I might as well start here. The thing is, you see, I am a monster," he said solemnly.

"On the battlefield that is!" he grinned, giving her a enthusiastic thumbs-up. "But seriously," he said, straightening out a bit. "Part of me thinks you're making all of this up to reel in a sucker like me for some nefarious scheme or another, but I'll play along for now," he shrugged. "Keeping you alive until we get back to Felson should be a decent first step in gaining your trust, I think?"

The booming voice that appeared out of nowhere cut him off from any additional comment he could have made. The whole bit about test-subjects didn't really sit well with Raith. That said, the voice seemed rather reasonable all things considered. Just one test, and then they could plunder whatever it was that they needed and be well on their way. That seemed pretty fair. Unfortunately, something about an "escaped test-subject" caused the man in charge to change his mind. So now he was going to kill them all. Great. So, who was the one who let out that Lina person?

"Well that's rather pleasant. I wouldn't worry too much though, we'll make it out of here alive," he said, turning to Isabelle.

"Trust me."

[Ether]

Lina scowled as her captor's voice began booming through the halls. She had supposed it was only a matter of time, but it was still unpleasant, all the same. On and on he blathered, giving her speeches and promises, his tempting little falsities, until he finally revealed his hand. As they had found her, he would kill them all. Not that he wouldn't have either done that or imprisoned them all regardless...

"Yes, of course he did. Don't fall for his lies, though. Even had you left me alone, he still would have either killed or captured you all were it in his power. He caught me in a trap last time, but in truth, he's afraid." Lina replied to Makin, licking her lips slightly as she finished her first piece.

"All he wants is for you to waste your time and energy turning on me, so that he can finish you all off more easily."

[Xinnidy]

"H-huh?!" Maja was as surprised as any other, flinching as the voice boomed throughout the upper room, glancing to the sides each time she felt the voice stronger from a particular direction. "Who... is this?" The voice seemed to talk them down pretty thoroughly, and in the end it decided to just threaten them. "If... if this is the one behind the monsters and everything, then we have no choice but to fight him, right?" Maja looked at Makin again. "We already got inside the castle, I think... that wasn't part of their plan already. This must be our chance."

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Kadin frowned, keeping close to the others, expecting some sort of monster to be hoisted at them at any point. "Well, that is a development." His ethereal spear formed in his hand, eyes scanning the room. Subject, huh? So, she's certainly not an ally to him. "What should we do now? If we don't move either, he will just send beasts to us until we're exhausted as well." That was concerning, it wasn't wise to split up in this completely foreign castle, was it?

[riariadne]

Valha's attitude had been mostly cautious but optimistic for the early morning, but all joy seemed to vanish from her as soon as she heard the unseen sorcerer speak. "You..."

That was all she could think clearly enough to say. Anger was not an unfamiliar emotion to Valha- far from it- but even for her, the outrage that began to build up was substantial. This was the man that eluded them! He sat lounged somewhere in the castle, sending terrible creations after them. This man had caused them nothing but trouble for the past few days, ever since they reached the bridge, and now he dared to speak to them with contempt? She just couldn't take it. And now she knew he could hear her.

"Where are you?!" she screeched. "You used your magic for this? Create a mockery of life for what? Try and play a god yourself?!"

The harpy brought her claws together, balled up into fists. She had walked forward far past Ingverd or the others up the stairs- even in her pure, blind rage, she didn't want to hurt any of her friends or allies. "You can't run from me! This castle isn't big enough for you to hide in- if you're behind a door, I'll tear them all down! There's no force strong enough to stop me in the world, much less that you'd know of! You killed one of us, and another wandered somewhere to oblivion, and devastated my best friend- and now, you've the audacity to think you can hide behind your creations after the pain you've brought us!" Valha quivered with an animalistic fury that made her previous bursts of anger look childish in comparison. For a brief moment, even her vision felt different from usual, and her claws seemed sharper- but the sensation vanished quickly.

She withdrew the cube, holding it above her head before lowering it, hands still shaking. "This stupid thing, is this what you wanted? I found it, and now it's mine- even though I don't care for much, I'll never let it go back into the hands of you! Not that those stupid monsters of yours have a chance of beating me. Throw whatever you want at me- I can take it all, easy! At this point I wouldn't be shocked to find out you're not even a threat yourself, hiding behind your pathetic puppets, but either way, you don't stand a chance! I'll make you suffer for what you've done here, and claw your throat out myself as soon as I can!"

Edited April 3, 2016 by Reinfleche

[Oersted]

As the group had continued onward, Lanos had lost to his self-doubt and then invited self-pity over for tea. He wondered why he'd ever thought being a mercenary was a good idea. Nothing had changed. He hadn't been able to protect anyone. Not Valha, and especially not Vriska.

Lanos was pulled out of his brooding by the suddenness of the unfamiliar voice. As the voice finished its spiel something inside the harpy snapped while at the same time yet another thing clicked. Whoever this was, whoever this bastard was, they were responsible for everything. The bridge, Vriska's death, the village, and, as far as Lanos knew, Maja turning on him. All of his suffering these past few days was because someone wanted to toy with the 'big and powerful mercenaries'. It was all their fault. And he wanted to make sure they suffered for it.

"This is all a game to you, isn't it!?" Lanos roared, accusingly. "Gather up whoever's stupid enough to come out here to this frozen hellhole and poke at them until they break! Who cares about them, or what they do, or who they lose, or how much they suffer just so long as you get entertainment, right!? Not anymore! I'm...!"

He'd wondered just what made hate 'hate' back in Felson. Now he knew.

"I'm gonna kill you!" As soon s the words left his lips he began to move forward, challenging the owner of the voice to stop him if they could.

Edited March 28, 2016 by Oersted

[SB.]

"I think his rudeness is the least of our worries." spat Angus through gritted teeth. Identifying the voice was difficult to say the least - although Angus scanned the room looking for the source, it was pretty difficult to locate considering it was coming from everywhere at once. It was kind of spooky, to be honest. What kind of magic was this guy capable of? It was very unlikely that voice projection and the box was the full extent of his power. "We have to find where it's coming from." muttered the archer, trying to talk himself into it. He didn't like this place. He'd found out the hard way that there were traps around, and the owner of the voice would doubtlessly know it better than they did.

[algae]

"So... Some crazy old wizard on a power trip?" Was every tragedy here really the result of some lunatic's megalomania? What did he hope to learn from all this? What could possibly justify it? Disgust overrode fear, at least for the moment. "What's the point, then? Cheap theatrics, land-grabbing, spooky warnings about experiments? How trite."

Think, though... What is the point? Maybe it is just some sick game? Spread rumors about treasure and toy with anyone greedy enough to come after it? But if he's truly powerful, he could have killed us at any time, and if he wasn't he could have just attacked us in our sleep... Except he did, so we've either survived everything he's thrown at us and his ego won't let him see that, or he's got us exactly where he wants us. If nothing else, he was clearly listening to them; maybe a few dismissive words would get under his skin. For better or worse. Probably worse, with their luck.

[Juliette]

This morning was quickly becoming less and less enjoyable. Not that Heather had particularly expected it to be pleasant, but still, it was devolving very fast. I don't enjoy being toyed with, but I can't imagine ranting further than everyone already has will do much, the elf pondered. Still, she readied her bow- danger could be around any corner, or worse, summoned upon them.

Edited April 3, 2016 by Juliette

[scorri]

Trist grumpily followed up behind everyone when the voice out of nowhere started talking. He sighed as everyone freaked out and just grouchily commented to Heather, "That's just about perfect. Monsters and magic last night, now we've got spooky disembodied voices threatening us. Why did I agree to come here again?"

[Juliette]

"I'm beginning to question that as well," Heather responded. "I think I underestimated how strange this would all be. Nonetheless, there's not much we can do now other than battle to escape. If I am to go on any more of these missions in the future, I'll need one very nice vacation..."

[scorri]

"Yeah. Good vacation and planned sentry watches." Trist hadn't quite let go of that quite yet. He sighed. "Right then. Lets get this over with. Oi! Stupid voice! Stop talking and actually fight us or let us leave. Playing games is stupid." As he yelled, he loosened his sword and got ready to draw it at the first sign of enemy movement.